Beauty Expos Are Murder

by Libby Klein

  Aunt Ginny giggled and took a sip. “Whoo! Poppy did not make the punch, did she?”

  I gave a conspiratorial look to Mrs. Davis. “I think I had some help.”

  Aunt Ginny shot forward in her chair. “You’ll never guess what I overheard at the beauty parlor. A gang of hooligans broke into Congress Hall and stole the supplies for the Twilight Egg Hunt. They’re going to have to cancel the whole event.”

  Sawyer brought in two trays of hors d’oeuvres and everyone began to help themselves. “Oh, I heard about that. What a shame. I was really looking forward to it too.”

  Gia was getting himself a cup of coffee, so I leaned in to ask, “What’s the Twilight Egg Hunt?”

  He took a sip of his coffee and started to choke. “Good God, what is in this?”

  Royce handed him the cream. “Here, try a little snort of this in there. It cuts through the fumes.”

  Sawyer answered for Gia, who was still trying to recover from his unintentional shot. “It’s a Cape May tradition. It started out with just a few tourists up for Easter weekend. They painted eggs with glow-in-the-dark dye and hid them on the lawn of Congress Hall, where they were staying. When the sun went down they put the kids to bed and the adults made a competition out of finding the eggs in the moonlight.”

  Fiona twittered from her spot on the sofa. “It sounds like fun.”

  Sawyer giggled. “The whole thing has grown into a huge event. Now there’s music and prizes, and all the proceeds go to charity. It started out just for adults, but now people even take their kids to it. It’ll be such a shame to see it canceled.”

  I asked Gia, “Have you ever been to that?”

  Gia smirked behind his Irish coffee. “Once or twice. Alcohol is definitely involved.”

  Mother Gibson was pouring herself a healthy cup of punch, and she caught my eye. “This will be your first tourist season as a business owner, won’t it?”

  “It will. Have any tips?”

  “Child . . . Get more insurance.”

  Gia laughed. “Get used to seeing a lot of skin. Tourists think clothing is optional at the beach.”

  Mrs. Davis squealed. “And that’s just the men!”

  That opened a discussion full of advice and warnings. The gist was that tourists are crazy, demanding, and come to create anarchy, steal your parking space, and eat soft-serve ice cream three times a day. Which I thought was ironic, because that also described Aunt Ginny and the biddies to a T.

  Aunt Ginny pointed out that whatever they could dish up, we could take it. And by we . . . she meant me. Because she had plans with Royce all summer.

  I glanced toward Gia to give him a grin and caught him watching me. The look in his eyes stole my breath. My heart ached in my chest.

  That was when Victory plodded her way into the dining room struggling under the cake, which was lit with enough fire to barbecue chicken legs. The dining room smoke alarm went off and Gia rushed over to take the cake from her while Fiona fanned a napkin at the ceiling.

  A low growl came from the corner, “I’d get up and help ya, but I just took my pain pill and I have to stay here.”

  “That’s okay, Iggy. We got it. Hurry up, Aunt Ginny! I think Victory put a hundred candles on the cake.”

  Aunt Ginny tried to get enough air to blow the candles out while Royce and Fiona helped enough to keep her from passing out.

  Victory gave me a sheepish smile. “I had sefentee candles on cake, but there was emptee square. Eet look seelly, so I add more.”

  Figaro galloped through the room with a swath of white down one side of his fur.

  Victory wrung her hands together. “Oh, um . . . while I look for beeger lighter, keitty may have swatted cake.”

  That was when we noticed the frosting roses were missing from one corner, and Figaro was under the wing chair licking vigorously at pink frosting up by his ear.

  Aunt Ginny threw her head back and laughed. “We may as well have a pet raccoon in the house.”

  The punch and coffee had been emptied faster than moonshine at a redneck wedding. Everyone enjoyed the food and cake, all except for one corner that no one wanted, given the evidence of the paw print, and eventually they ambled on home. Sawyer and I cleaned up while Aunt Ginny and Royce lounged on the sofa, holding hands and sipping “coffee.”

  While we carried dishes into the kitchen, I went over my afternoon tea idea. “I’m doing two seatings. One o’clock and three. Do you want to help me? The advertisement has gotten more hits than I expected, and I’ve had forty-two reservations. I’m just about at capacity.”

  Sawyer bit her lip and wouldn’t look me in the eye. “I would love to, but . . . I have a lot going on. Weekends are very busy from Easter to Memorial Day, and Through the Looking Glass gets a lot of traffic. And . . . and weekdays I have a lot of paperwork.... I just have a lot of extra chaos in my life right now. What? You don’t believe me?”

  I finished wrapping the leftover cake for Royce to take home. “Why wouldn’t I believe you?”

  “You’re giving me a look.”

  “’Cause you’re acting weird about it. It’s okay that you can’t help. What’s the new chaos in your life?”

  “What? Nothing. It’s just . . . you know. Stuff. See, you’re giving me that look again.”

  “You’re being cagey.”

  “Well, I can’t talk about it right now.”

  Aunt Ginny’s inner scandal beacon sounded, and she rushed into the kitchen. “Can’t talk about what?”

  Sawyer’s face went beet red and she looked like she was trying to find a hole to crawl into, so I went on a mission of mercy and diverted to the afternoon tea. “I think I’m going to set up tables all around the wraparound porch. I may need some extra hands.”

  Aunt Ginny waved her jeweled fingers. “I’ll take care of it.”

  “Well, Aunt Ginny, I rather think it’s too much for you too.”

  Aunt Ginny made a face. “What? No. Not me. I have plans. I mean I’ll hire someone who can help.”

  Sawyer and I exchanged a look of concern. “You’ll hire someone?”

  “Yes. I’ve done it before.”

  That’s what worries me.

  In the hallway we overheard Victory giggling. “Seelly keitty. No more jelly bean for you.”

  “Don’t worry.” Aunt Ginny picked up the leftover cake for Royce. “I got you, Boo.”

  She left through the door to the dining room and Sawyer snickered. “Boo.”

  My stress level rose an octave as I worried that my event would turn into the Mad Hatter’s tea party. I got a glass of water and dropped to the banquette to mourn all the snacks I could have eaten at the party but hadn’t. The door to the dining room was still swinging, and I marveled at how similar Aunt Ginny was to the Cheshire cat. She loved to create chaos, then disappear.

  CHAPTER 8

  After another fitful night in a long string of insomnia and bad dreams, my alarm clock went off in the middle of the song “Tainted Love.” I smacked the Snooze button and had almost fallen back asleep when I heard Figaro hurling on my throw rug. He had a room full of hardwood plus the ceramic tile in the bathroom if he should happen to get sick, but no. He preferred to keep his paws warm while doing his dirty business. “I told you that cake was going to make you sick.”

  Figaro lifted a paw and flopped onto his side as if to say worth it!

  Today was our last day to prepare for the Expo. It officially opened on Wednesday, but we would spend all day tomorrow setting up. Kim had gotten us in touch with a printer who made custom napkins that said Paleo Treats, and Gia had ordered a ten-by-ten trade show canopy the color of espresso with La Dolce Vita scrolled across all sides in cream-colored letters. Everything was supposed to arrive today for final inspection before we carted it to Convention Hall in the morning.

  I dressed in teal leggings and an ivory tunic and noticed that both had a little extra room from the last time I’d worn them. Apparently, the have-so-much-anxiety-you-rarely-eat d
iet was working wonders. Not for my hair, which was flat, or my skin, which was dull, but my pants were baggy, so who needs shiny hair and skin?

  Aunt Ginny was already in the kitchen dressed in blue jeans and a black leather tank top. She had a matching black leather fisherman’s cap, and her eyes were ringed with black eyeliner that I was 80 percent sure was on purpose. She was either ready for barhopping or joining a geriatric gang. “Where are you going so early?”

  She grabbed the teakettle just as it was starting to whistle. “Going? I just got home.”

  “You’ve been out all night?”

  “Don’t be so surprised. I’ve stayed out all night lots of times.”

  “What were you doing?”

  “Eating hot dogs.”

  “For eight hours?”

  “No. Just one.”

  “Where did you find an open hot dog stand in the middle of the night?”

  Aunt Ginny gave me some side-eye. “No one’s open in the middle of the night.”

  I poured the ground coffee beans into the press pot, determined not to let this conversation beat me. “So, where’d you get the hot dogs?”

  “What are you, the wiener police? A little fella named Skippy. No. Slappy. No, that can’t be right.”

  I poured the water over the grounds and set the timer while Aunt Ginny held an argument with herself over the name of the random stranger who’d apparently sold her the dogs out of a bicycle hotbox. I should find out how long it’s been since she had a tetanus shot.

  “Anyway. We got the tickets!”

  Okay, I zoned out too long. “Tickets for what?”

  “Dr. Lance Rubin, silly. The girls and I waited in line all night. They just went on sale this morning. He’s the New York plastic surgeon everyone’s talking about. He was on Good Morning America? His seminar is Friday.” She fished a stack of yellow cards out of the rim of her hat. “Here, we got one for you too.”

  Rubinesque Cosmetic Surgery. “What’s so special about this that you waited in line all night?”

  “The topic is ‘Aging Invisibly. ’ ”

  I looked at the crooked lipstick in the creases around Aunt Ginny’s mouth. Isn’t it rather too late for that? “Thank you, but I’m not sure I can go. I’ll be manning the La Dolce Vita booth.”

  “It would do you a world of good to get a consultation while you’re there. I saw the way you and Gia were looking at each other when you didn’t know the other was watching. But until that other woman is out of the picture, you gotta fight back. And I say there’s no better way to fight fire than to fight fire with liposuction and a butt lift.”

  I poured her a cup of coffee and sloshed some of it on my wrist. “Aunt Ginny!”

  “What?! That man is smitten. But that’s today. You could use some tips to keep him interested in the long haul, so he sticks around.”

  Right now I wanted tips on how to be anywhere but here.

  Aunt Ginny put her coffee down and took my hand. “There will be cutting-edge beauty products that aren’t even on the market yet. Miracle creams. And after security hauled away that nellie with the protest sign, we overheard a rumor that Dr. Rubin is going to announce a breakthrough that takes ten years off your face after just a couple uses.”

  “So, if you use it for a month, will you look like a five-year-old?”

  Aunt Ginny narrowed her eyes and took her coffee back. “Edith said you’d be a pill about this.”

  “What?” I laughed. “I’m kidding. I’ll try to be there, okay?”

  Aunt Ginny gave me a droll look, but I could see a hint of a twinkle behind the robin’s-egg-blue eye shadow.

  * * *

  I tried the back door at La Dolce Vita, but it was locked. I had my own key, but I’d left it in the bowl by the front door when I stopped to clean up Figaro’s masterpiece that was once an African violet. He watched me smugly from the library to be sure I recognized his signature move: potting soil flung up the wall.

  I knocked, but no one answered. So now I had to walk down the alley and around the pretzel shop to the front of the walking mall. I passed Mia Famiglia and Sawyer’s Through the Looking Glass across the way, an ice cream shop, a specialty bath store, and a shop selling rude T-shirts and kitchen towels that was always busy.

  The bell chimed as I let myself in the front, and the warm richness of freshly roasted coffee beans cascaded over me in a wave. My pastry case was full to the brim of lemon tarts, hot cross buns, and gluten-free muffins in pistachio white chocolate, pineapple macadamia, and chocolate cherry chip, which usually sold out first because they were half a step away from being cupcakes you could eat for breakfast. The line was several customers deep and Gia was working the espresso bar the way a concert violinist rocks out Vivaldi.

  The hair on the back of my neck stood up as I saw who was handing out my precious baked goods. Alex gave me a delicate little wave while she passed a bagged pastry to the man who works in the T-shirt shop next door. Get your hands off my muffins!

  Sierra, the cute little college girl Gia had hired to make me jealous, came out of the back room dragging an industrial-sized bag of roasted espresso beans and spotted Alex at the register. “Hey. What are you doing? I said I’d be right back.”

  Alex caught my eye and a victorious smirk crossed her face for only a moment.

  The commotion caught Gia’s attention and he looked up and saw the women squaring off. Then his gaze drifted to me. His expression was on lockdown, but I was sure I caught a flicker of exasperation.

  I walked past Alex, who was insisting that she was just trying to help, and Sierra, whining that if Alex had wanted to help, she could have gotten the coffee beans from the storeroom. Then Gia calmly but firmly said, “Basta,” and they both silenced.

  My mind was whirling with important thoughts like, how did Sierra know “basta” meant enough? And was Alex trying to push out all the women who worked for Gia? How did Gia keep surrounding himself with size twos when I’m a size—not two? And could I really hold his interest against all the sexy women who showed up here to get his coffee every day? There were a lot of ways to advertise that you were interested in a man, and I couldn’t pull off any of them.

  I unlocked the back door out of principle and went in the pantry to take out ingredients for some late-addition cookies for the Expo. A couple of weeks ago I’d cut out all the carbs to try to trick my body into losing weight. I didn’t know if it was working or not; so far all that was happening was I had to pee all the time and I kept having dreams that I’d accidentally eaten a can of frosting while standing in the bathtub. But it did give me some new recipe ideas to fool around with.

  I’d had a moment of inspiration while cooking breakfast and invented keto maple bacon chocolate chip cookies in my head. I was also going to make some Paleo lemon coconut macaroons and Paleo breakfast cookies with hemp, chia seeds, carrots, walnuts, and flaxseed. The Expo opened at nine every day, so they should be a big hit.

  Alex had been kicked out of the dining room and came to wreak havoc in the kitchen. “So, you are here again today. Are you sure you need to make more cookies? We’ll never sell everything you’ve made now.” She smiled brightly, like we were long-lost best friends catching up over Nehi and oatmeal creme pies. It made me want to punch her in the clavicle.

  I tried not to be obvious that I was scanning her from head to toe, but the woman knew how to work every inch of what she had. She looked like she was wrapped in one long bandage, with strategic bits of skin peeking out from the crisscrosses. I wrapped my canvas apron around my waist and noticed I’d spilled melted chocolate on my boob the last time I was here. That’s special.

  “Gia and I were up late last night talking about him taking some time off so we could get away to work things out.”

  My head shot up from my recipe and a muscle in my neck popped.

  “He said he doesn’t have anyone who could take over the shop while he’s gone. I don’t suppose you know anyone who could help, do you? We really need
some time together. I think it would be wonderful for Henry to have a baby brother or sister.”

  Because having a baby fixed everything the last time.

  Gia strode into the kitchen under a black cloud and went toe-to-toe with Alex. “Why are you here? You said you wanted to spend the day with Henry, not come to my business and get in the way.”

  Alex cocked her head to the side and turned on the most innocent tone of voice. “I wanted to see you while Henry was in preschool. Did you think more about what we talked about last night?” Alex slid her eyes to me to see if I was paying attention. I looked away and dropped a huge dollop of coconut oil into my mixing bowl. It splattered on my other boob. “I think Poppy would be perfect to run the shop on her own for a few days. She seems very capable and smart.”

  Gia practically had steam coming out of his ears, but his face remained calm. “I am not interested in going anywhere with you except court. Did you relock that door after I opened it this morning?”

  Alex swatted him playfully on the arm. “Yes, silly. We don’t want just anyone walking in here. Like the time that drunk man thought our apartment was his house. Remember how you had to chase him out in your underwear because we were in bed?”

  Gia looked up at the ceiling and groaned. “You need to go. I don’t care where. Go to Momma’s. Go to Karla’s. Go sit in the alley. But you are not staying here. And I want you to leave Poppy alone.”

  He had more to say, but the tone in Sierra’s “Gia, I need backup!” made him run from the kitchen back to the front.

  Alex made a look that reminded me of Cruella De Vil when she first got the idea to make a puppy coat. “Did you see the fire in his eyes? Be careful. You never want to push a Larusso too far.” Then Alex sauntered over to the back door, turned to face me, and clicked the lock back into place, so I was sure to know she was the one who had locked me out.

  No wonder Momma loves her.

  Alex hopped up on the counter and swung her legs back and forth. “I want to help out at the Expo.”

  “Mm-hmm.”

  “I was thinking you should probably stay behind the scenes and I should serve the diet cookies.”